Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton went after Vice President JD Vance Saturday over his comments downplaying the Watergate scandal, using the moment to land a pair of pointed jabs at both the vice president and the Republican Party.
Clinton was responding to a New York Times report headlined "Vance Downplays Watergate and Compares Himself to Nixon." According to the story, Vance argued that the scandal which ended Richard Nixon's presidency would amount to "like a 12-hour news story" if it unfolded today, and suggested the "deep state" had been responsible for taking Nixon down.
Clinton's first swipe took aim at Vance's grasp of the history itself — and at his administration's record on book bans.
"Maybe Vance doesn't know this history because it's in one of the books his administration banned," she wrote.
Her second was aimed at the broader Republican Party, drawing a contrast between the lawmakers of the Watergate era and those serving today.
"The difference between Watergate and now is that back then, Republicans actually did something about a law-breaking president," Clinton wrote. "Today, they only roll over for their cult leader."
The reference points to the bipartisan reckoning that followed the Watergate break-in, when Republican leaders ultimately pressed Nixon toward resignation rather than defend him through impeachment proceedings.
Vance's reported framing inverts that history, casting Nixon less as a president brought down by his own conduct than as a target of unelected government forces — a narrative that echoes the grievance politics central to the current administration.
Clinton, a frequent and unsparing critic of President Donald Trump and his allies, has shown little hesitation in needling the administration on social media, and her latest post folded two of the left's recurring criticisms — book bans and Republican deference to Trump — into a single response.